© José Gonçalves
THESIS DETAILS:
The decentralization of the industrial city, brought about by the humanitarian and sociological crisis in urban centers at the end of the 18th century, solidified the hegemonic roles that industry and infrastructure currently play in urban expansion, albeit incompatibly with urban life. This “removal of process” from cities (Rappaport 2014) compelled us to design industry away from cities instead of adapting industry to them.
Although this crisis was resolved, nowadays with the incessant cultural and ludic densification of river-front areas in cities worldwide - and the aforementioned peripheralization of industry from these locations - there have been tensions between these newfound uses and irreplaceable industry, still in use.
In the oriental edge of Lisbon there is a silage terminal – The Beato Silage Terminal, that by managing more that 20% of all grain that the country consumes, is an irreplaceable element in Lisbon’s port.
This irreplaceable industry, in the face of Beato’s newfound creative development as well as Lisbon’s riverfront massive urban projects creates a new architectural stranglehold.
Given this clash of forces, could this infrastructure be integrated into Beato's urbanity, instead of being removed or completely separated from the city? Could it simultaneously be, as an hybrid building, adapted to meet the needs of the Beato region as the new creative hub of Lisbon?
For this integration to be possible, a symbiotic relationship of value between two main programs is created a long with the utilization of a subproduct of the silage process.
In beato, art is produced and not exposed, therefore the creation of ways to integrate the art community with its desired public is imperative. Yet proposing an artistic center could be a catalyst towards gentrification and therefore could be an inadequate solution.